Hawaiian street food! July 21st Farm Report.

What’s your go-to comfort food?

Rice, soya sauce, grilled meat patty. Hawaiian-style. Replace grilled meat with air-fried SPAM and my memories go straight back to Maui and their precocious pineapples. And geckos on the walls. Too many chickens. Hot Island Glass Works. And Kauai with its greenhouse vegetation.

MONDAY, JULY 21/25 FARM REPORT.

We learned our lesson about putting TS’ right paw in a nitrile glove. Her palm has to dry out and heal (carpal tunnel corrective surgery is a bitch to recover from). She was able to find her inner string and resume modified gardening. PN regained an assistant and analytical planner-assessor for DIY woodworking.

Once our second campfire wood drying bin is ready, we can finish clearing the north parking lot and set up the Shelter-Logic pop-up carport. It’s a 1-3 year solution until we can afford a 2-car garage. 2nd Car = ATV + snowblower + Kubota tractor. 🚜 Our existing 2005 Toyota Echo hasn’t weathered well. At summer’s end, we’ll have it towed to the Wiarton Service Center for a critical assessment. Our Toyota Tacoma? I love my TACO. It’s our primary purple people mover.

SINGLED-HANDED (BY NECESSITY) = TS was able to thin out our forest of deep-rooted, feral mullein. She’ll be using that green matter for raised beds and layered composting. TS also kept my spirits up while I was climbing around the firewood bin, anchoring chicken-wire.

NEEM TREE PLANS = Once we use up all of the construction lumber waste (being dried out by those two grilled bins), I can repurpose 1 for roadside firewood sales.

After dinner, we’ll troop back outside to the FREE-STANDING, DAY-USE ONLY pavilion and re-measure for plywood cladding.

• Did you know local Home Hardware Building Centre won’t post their plywood stock online nor their prices? It’s THAT competitive and prone to market fluctuations.
• That’s frustrating, as I have no idea whether they have stock on hand. I don’t want to walk into the store like a newbie and get fleeced.
• They might charge me a fuel surcharge if they have to bring it up from their warehouse. I know for sure they’ll charge me a delivery fee!
• I want to support my local building centre, however, I suspect I can get a better price at the Owen Sound Home Despot. I just have to be willing to use my ATV transport-trailer to run it back home.
• Will my local building centre match prices with the BIG ORANGE BLOB in Owen Sound? Stay tuned…

PROBLEMS = Our home has an alarm system, that’s monitored off-site. It’s e-shed temperature sensors are too sensitive. If I want them to be re-adjusted by the alarm technician, it’ll cost me $110/hour for travel time — RETURN. If they come from Hannover, that’s close to a 4 hour round trip… $400 CAD just to show up. No. Just no. I’ll self-manage the system. Hell, I’d pay $400 to TS to adjust it. Bitch, bitch, bitch. I know… home ownership isn’t cheap.

PROBLEMS = We screwed up the pressure differentials with our home and had the pellet boiler burp smoke and soot into our mechanical room… that spilled into the west mud room, that seeped into the house. Smoke alarms blared. We purged the smoke with a floor fan blasting from the outside door, into the mud room, and into the mechanical room. Dammit. Our house is too airtight (despite having an ERV, that normally runs during the heating season). During hot smokey summer days, if we keep the windows closed, run extractor fans, dehumidifiers, and a Mitsubishi A/C… air pressures go wonky!

RESOLUTIONS = Thankfully, my HVAC company charges me a fair rate and honour their commitments. Our wood pellet boiler wasn’t installed with an exterior intake vent (I blame my ex-construction manager for that oversight [trust, but verify]). To use a cliche from Mike Holmes (“Holmes On Homes”), my HVAC people “made it right” and covered the time and materials. I won’t abuse that good-will.

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